King Salman Goes to Southeast Asia

[yt_dropcap type=”square” font=”” size=”14″ color=”#000″ background=”#fff” ] L [/yt_dropcap]ast week, Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud kicked off a month-long tour in Asia in a bid to win over one of the fastest growing regions in the world. Responding to the steady decline of American influence in the Middle East, the scrapping of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and China’s expanding clout, Saudi Arabia has been hedging its bets over the past few months by deepening its commercial and political relationships with countries like the United Kingdom and Japan.

Over the long term, this makes it more likely Riyadh will turn away from its traditional relationship with Washington and build new partnerships with Asia’s emerging powers, but given Beijing’s stance on hot-button issues like Syria, this new set of alliances are likely to pose an entirely different array of geopolitical challenges.

King Salman’s timing for the trip to Asia is not coincidental. His kingdom’s economy is wrestling with deflation, falling oil prices and growing budget deficits. In response, the country has unveiled Vision 2030, a plan to diversity its economy (which is heavily reliant on revenues from oil) and attract foreign investment. Fully realizing those ambitions – which many analysts have taken with a grain of salt – won’t be possible without Asian investors on board. East Asia is already Saudi’s biggest energy market and the one with the greatest potential for growth.

The king’s tour of the region has already been accompanied by new agreements. Last week, the Saudis sealed two major deals in Malaysia and Indonesia: national oil champion Aramco signed a $7 billion agreement with Malaysia’s PETRONAS on Tuesday and concluded a $6 billion deal for a range of refinery projects with Indonesia’s PT Pertamina the day after. Salman’s delegation will be looking for even more significant deals in Japan and China, where he is due to touch down later this month.

The Saudi king is expected to arrive in China after the end of the annual parliamentary session in Beijing on March 15th. Trade between the two countries has grown from roughly $1 billion in 1990 to more than $70 billion in 2013, surpassing Saudi-US trade. In early 2016, President Xi Jinping traveled to Riyadh as part of his first official visit to the Middle East since he came into office in 2013. During his stay, the two countries agreed to create a more comprehensive strategic partnership that would include collaboration in the economic, political, and security fields. More recently, in August, Riyadh signed 15 preliminary agreements with Beijing, covering projects ranging from oil storage to housing construction. The deals were sealed during a high-profile visit by Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – the monarch’s son and the power behind the throne overseeing Vision 2030.

Although plenty of commercial opportunities await in China, Beijing’s other foreign policy objectives have left it at loggerheads with the Saudis. While it’s true that China has taken a utilitarian approach to the Middle Eastern monarchies by sweeping human rights concerns under the rug, Beijing has nonetheless vexed Gulf states by aligning itself with Iran in Syria. From a Saudi point of view, this position is far more egregious than any perceived American missteps, even former president Obama’s refusal to enforce the “red line” he drew on Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons. Saudi Arabia is one of the primary actors backing the Syrian opposition, and China’s positioning on the conflict is sure to be a sore spot.

In reality, Saudi Arabia’s pivot away from the US and toward China is far from clear-cut. The crux of the matter is that Western support remains invaluable for Saudi Arabia, regardless of the potential opportunities that exist in the Asia-Pacific. Despite increased tensions between Riyadh and Washington, the bedrock of their partnership – oil for security – is expected to remain intact for some years to come. Nor are the Americans the only Western partner the Saudis rely on: by opening a new Royal Navy base in Bahrain and spelling out their support for the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) against Iranian security threats, the UK has reversed its longstanding “east of Suez” policy and reinvested itself in the stability of the Persian Gulf.

Prime Minister Theresa May’s participation in the GCC summit last December culminated in a number of deals to strengthen security and trade ties with Saudi Arabia and its neighbors. After the summit, May said the UK would invest more than £3 billion in defense spending in the region over the next decade, in part to help counter Iran’s influence. Nor is Britain’s renewed commitment to regional affairs purely focused on matters of defense: the two sides also outlined plans to further boost trade between Britain and the GCC, which totaled £30 billion in 2015. May’s visit came in the context of the UK’s drive to solidify existing trade ties and build new ones ahead of Brexit, and her commercial diplomacy happens to dovetail especially well with Riyadh’s push to diversify its own economy.

All of these developments, from Salman’s travels to Theresa May’s GCC outreach, are part of a fundamental restructuring of regional alliances that date back to the Cold War. With American influence and interest in the Middle East waning, it’s in Asia that Riyadh will find the investors and business partners it needs to survive in a post-oil world. The Saudis will need to decide whether they are willing to hold their nose faced with Beijing’s comparatively close ties with Syria and Iran, even if the reward is continued economic viability.

Irredentism and Islamic separatism in Thailand

The one-month cessation of hostilities proclaimed at the beginning of April by the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN, the “National Revolutionary Front”) already witnessed to its end on the very first days of May. April was the first month without a single attack in 16 years. Due to the COVID-19pandemic, the rebels themselves took the decision to “cease all the activities” unilaterally in order to give way to health workers to operate in a secure context. The group kept faith to its communiqué stating that the hostilities would resume if the police attacked them[1].

Since 1963, the BRN spearheaded the whole secessionist movement of Malay Muslims, and, in a later period, started to organize a proper rebellion against the state with hundreds of members. The BRN’s course of action was embedded in left-wing aspirations of an Islamic socialism and Malay nationalism, in pursuit of the creation an independent Malay-Muslim country.

Nowadays, one of the debates concerning the insurgency’s nature is hinged on the question of the possibility that the struggle may be no longer based on ethnic claim of land, but on the modern-day Islamic extremism. There has been a great concern by intelligence assessment agencies[2] that the separatists could be redirect into new forms of action, namely the transnational jihad, by external actors and social forces.

In fact, notwithstanding the ethnic-based violence, it may seem plausible to conjecture a slow insertion of the insurgents in the larger context of terrorism taking place mainly in the Middle East. Such conjectures could be made on the basis of several attacks perpetrated, where pattern of victims’ shared identity traits was not yet Thai but actually Christian. Among the organizations that partake in the insurgency, a few have not only been described by the UN as terrorist groups, but also, like in the case of Jemaah Islamiyah, have been found linked with Al-Qaeda[3].In this case indeed, it is correct to speak of a religious motive behind the killings as, in 2005, it got sadly famous with the beheadings of Christian girls in the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.

Yet, the essence of the unrest itself seems still to be linked to an irredentist will of conquest, not a religious one aiming at the establishment of a panregional caliphate, which is typical of Daesh, al-Qaeda and al-Nusra, for example.

The theatrical terrorism of ISIS and al-Qaeda, featured with mass killings, suicide bombings and identification of the whole West as the enemy, does not appeal to Thai insurgents, who have also tried to gain diplomatic support by Sunni countries like Saudi Arabia. Mimicking their style of action or openly siding with them would mean losing the little legitimacy that is left.

The ethnic-nationalistic goal puts the insurgents on another piece of the political chessboard: whereas Daesh and al-Qaeda have had notably the complete rejection and destruction of the western US-led international system, they would prefer to be a part of it, provided an independent state.

It may be of use to think of “jihad” and “jihadism” as two different concepts[5]. Whilst jihadism is more closely related to al-Qaeda and ISIS, asserting a transnational Islamic caliphate, the former may be intended more “simply” as a war against a non-Muslim enemy for, as in this case, a nation-building process – thus, virtually incompatible with the pan-Islamic state. As a matter of fact, it is already evident how different their projects fundamentally are, even conceptually. The Salafi doctrine embraced by the jihadists is altogether rejected by the military and ideological chiefs of the rebellion, meaning the BRN above all.

In Thailand, Salafism is spearheaded by the Saudi educated Ismail Lufti Japakiya, rector of the private Fatoni Islamic university, founded in 2004 by Arab foundations and now receiving government funding[6]. He preaches the reconciliation with the Thai state in a way that is not well-welcomed by the BRN, which is by eschewing violence and trying a more pacific way in approaching the issue. So, while separatists are generally against Salafism, the Thai government is fostering it in the perspective of laying down an alternative path for Muslims’ discontent.

Nevertheless, a collision of ideologies among the high-ranking leaders does not mean that the lower cadres are actually involved in these more nuanced questions. It is more realistic to think of the majority of them as engaged in a battle where one can get the most out of it when the Thai state and society is endangered.

The deadliest attacks of the latest years may shed a light on the question we are attempting to give an answer to. Some actors on this stage are clearly siding/sympathizing for UN-declared international criminals, but this does not permit to generalize to groups like the BRN or the PULO, who still remain organizations guilty of the death of civilians, children included[7].

Considering that the death toll, that was about 892 in 2007, went down to 218 in 2018, it does feel like having lost much of what was “accomplished”. On the other hand, there has been indeed a gradual rapprochement between the state and the rebels already before the shooting, represented by the talks to which the BRN have begun to participate just recently after years of internal disputes between currents. In the negotiations, the Majlis Syura Patani (Patani Consultative Council, MARA Patani) is the body that stands for the militant groups, which have shown availability for ceasing fire temporarily, due to the COVID-19 situation.

The shooting took place at a security checkpoint on 5th November 2019, when rebels stormed in killing fifteen among policemen and village defense volunteers, making it one of the most disruptive and violent attacks of the last 20 years, also given the use of more advanced techniques of guerrilla and technologies in making IEDs[8]. It is suggested that the perpetrators could have been the BRN[9] and, again, as the target was clearly defined as the police and the village defense volunteers, the jihadist path may be excluded.

Yet, the conditions for a jihadist transition are present, meaning the fact of being a Sunni minority fighting against a non-Muslim country around which has been built a narrative of oppression and new colonialism. If violent fringes like the Jemaah Islamiyah continue to perpetrate horrible acts such the abovementioned one, or, conversely, massacres like those in 2004 at the Krue Se Mosque and in Tak Bai keep on happening, there will be always a high risk of Islamization relying on the exasperation of tones between the state and the insurgents, contextualized obviously in a broader framework where Salafist terrorism gets popularized and finds financial means to sustain its action.

Apart from exacerbating the whole situation once again, resuming the fight means that it will be unlikely to have the BRN do such a thing in the future. The peace talks represent now the best and only possibility for southern Thailand to reach stabilization, but it depends on how each side will be prone to concede to the other.

[1]Benar News. “Bloodshed Returns to Insurgency-hit Thai Deep South after Month of Inactivity.” 4 May 2020.

Related

“We look at India as a very good, close friend. We should continue to work to reenergise the bilateral relationship and need to focus on strengthening people-to-people contact”, said H.E. Dato Nazirah Hussain, who formerly served as Malaysian Ambassador to Thailand and as High Commissioner to Sri Lanka and the Maldives. She was speaking at the Video Conference on “India-ASEAN Trade and Geopolitical Engagements” organised by the Society for Policy Research and Empowerment (SPRE), a New Delhi based think tank, on May 30, 2020.

Ambassador Hussain is a distinguished diplomat and has also served in the Malaysian Embassy in China and Singapore. She was also the Director General of the ASEAN Department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Malaysia. She shared her experiences of participating in the ASEAN-India meetings. She also emphasised that even at the level of leaders, they need to talk directly on contentious issues and resolve them. Ambassador Hussain also lauded India’s role in the pharmaceutical sector saying that India has been the father of generic medicines.

The session was moderated by Dr. Faisal Ahmed, a leading trade and geopolitical expert on the Indo-Pacific, and an Associate Professor of International Business at FORE School of Management. Dr. Ahmed welcomed the speakers and the participants and presented his initial remarks. He said that ASEAN is an economically progressive, culturally vibrant and a geopolitically significant congregation. He said that India and the countries of ASEAN share a strong civilizational and cultural ties. Dr. Ahmed cited some trade statistics to emphasise on the volume of trade. He mentioned that in 2018-19, the merchandise trade between India and ASEAN stood at $97 billion. The services trade accounted between them accounted for $45 billion.

In his welcome remarks, Dr. Ahmed specifically mentioned about some key frameworks including Act East Policy, and also India-ASEAN FTAs in goods and services. He also emphasized that India and ASEAN are mutually important in terms of resources, sea routes, defence, investments, value chains, regional connectivity, and cultural cooperation, as well. Geopolitically too, he said that, India and ASEAN are indispensable for each other as they share the Indian Ocean resources and the security architecture therein. Moreover, in the Indo-Pacific construct too, he stressed that ASEAN Centrality plays a strategic role. Dr. Ahmed maintained that both India and ASEAN are strategically and geo-economically significant for each other.

After Ambassador Hussain, the next eminent speaker was Prof.Rajaram Panda. Heserves as Lok Sabha Research Fellow, and is also a Member of the Governing Council of Indian Council for World Affairs (ICWA). He is an eminent scholar and also served as Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) Chair Professor at Reitaku University in Japan.

Prof. Panda maintained that India’s relation with ASEAN has a long historical past characterised by civilizational linkages. Talking about security and political dimensions, he emphasised that India is a strong participant in East Asia Summit, ADMM+ and other such institutional arrangements and has been playing a very constructive role. He also talked about the South China Sea geopolitics and said that the Sea has emerged as a hotspot. He stressed that China’s aggressive and assertive posturing in the South China Sea is threatening the security of several ASEAN countries including Vietnam. He talked about the 2016 verdict of the Permanent Court of Arbitration which rejected China’s historical claims in the South China Sea. Also mentioning the nine dash line, he said that India should not feel shy of coming out in support of the ASEAN countries.

Further, Prof.Le Van Toan, an erudite scholar who serves as a Professor in Ho Chi Minh National Academy of Politics in Hanoi, Vietnam, presented his views on Vietnam-India relations. Prof.Toan, who headed the Indian Studies Centre in Vietnam and has been engaged in several policy level and Track II dialogues with India, said that thefuture of India-Vietnam relations will depend on what we do today.

Prof.Toanmaintained that so far Vietnam has contributed very responsibly in global affairs. He also said that we need to look into the cultural traditions which have shaped India-Vietnam relationship over the years. Speaking about comprehensive strategic partnership, he said that Vietnam already has diplomatic relations with 198 countries in the world, however, it has entered into comprehensive partnership only with three countries viz. India, China and Russia. He said that the relationship between Vietnam and China is a very sensitive one wherein China puts threat and pressure on Vietnam, while Vietnam has always tried to respond amicably. But as far as India is concerned, he said that among the three comprehensive partners, India is the most trusted friend for Vietnam.

The next speaker was Dr. Rajan Sudesh Ratna who is an Economic Affairs Officer in the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) in New Delhi. Dr. Ratna, who earlier served in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India for twenty years, including his stint as the Joint Director General of Foreign Trade, discussed about his experiences of negotiating the India-ASEAN framework agreement in 2003. He said that the entire Early Harvest Program (EHP) of India-ASEAN Framework Agreement was dropped because India wanted a very stringent rules of origin (ROO) from ASEAN, fearing that trade would circumvent from China throughASEANto India.He also maintained that when we started negotiating the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) in 2010, we were of course aware about such issues related to negotiating with China. He believed that perhaps it did not reflect good on our negotiations that in 2019, we were still not ready to join the RCEP.

Dr. Ratna, who served as a Professor at the Centre for WTO Studies in Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi, also mentioned that China is the cheapest supplier in the world. If we buy most of our import requirements from other suppliers at a higher cost, our ability to export finished product at a competitive price will also suffer. He gave an example from pharmaceutical sector and said that the sector is dependent on China for its Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) imports. Talking about services, Dr. Ratna said that the major problem is not market access, but Mutual Recognition Agreement by which qualifications can be mutually recognised by India and ASEAN governments. Also, he emphasised that the supply chain of inter-linking services with goods did not happen between India and ASEAN. For instance, he said that during the 2000s, ASEAN was a manufacturing hub of hardware and India specialised in software, yet a mutually beneficial inter-linking between the hardware and software could not be established.

Presenting a perspective from Thailand, eminent scholar Prof.Jaran Maluleem, Professor of Political Science in Thammasat University, Bangkok talked on several issues ranging from trade to education. He said that since the beginning of the 21st century, the relationship between India and Thailand has enhanced to a large extent. Mentioning about the Thailand-India trade agreement, he said that it helped eradicate obstacles to bilateral trade and increased the trade volume between the two countries. He also discussed on the positive role played by the industry chambers in both India and Thailand for enhancing bilateral relations.

Prof.Maluleem also emphasised on the historical and cultural relationship between the two countries, and stressed on the potential for cooperation in tourism, science and technology, investments, strategic and military affairs, and other areas. Being a leading figure in establishing the Indian Studies Program in Thailand, Prof. Maluleem also talked about the educational cooperation between India and Thailand and said that there is a very huge potential for educational exchange and future cooperation in this sector.

Another speaker Dr. Mohd. Faheem, Lecturer, Pridi Banomyong International College at Thammasat University in Bangkok, emphasised on the connectivity issues. He presented his views on the opportunities and challenges of physical connectivity between India and ASEAN. He said that immediately after India embraced economic reforms in 1991, it decided to focus on Southeast Asian countries and adopted the Look East Policy in 1992. Later, the Look East Policy was transformed into Act East Policy. Dr. Faheem further emphasised that Thailand is very strategically located to enhance the connectivity between India and ASEAN. India’s neighbourhood diplomacy, he said, has helped improve focus on sub-regional groups in the region, in which Thailand has a significant role. He maintained that through connectivity, we can improve trade and economic integration, and also enhance people’s mobility between India and ASEAN countries.

During his talk, Dr. Faheem also focused on the importance of engaging youths to enhance bilateral relations. He said that more than half of the ASEAN population is under the age of 35, which provides good opportunity for future cooperation. Dr. Faheem, who is basically a geographer, said that the two most important geographies pertinent to India-ASEAN connectivity projects are Northeast India and Myanmar. He cited the example of two connectivity projects namely Kaladan multimodal project, and, the India-Myanmar-Thailand trilateral Highway as being crucial and significant for both India and ASEAN.

Taking forward the deliberation, Dr. Mana Southichack, an international trade economist and Executive Director of Lao Intergro, a Vientiane based consulting firm in Lao PDR, presented his views on Laos-India engagements. He said that Laos is a small, landlocked country, with a population of 7 million. On India-Laos bilateral relation, he said that it has been growing in the recent years in economic as well as strategic aspects. He stated that Laos has gradually gained from the establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community. He emphasised that the level of development in Laos has been increasing in recent years at a satisfactory rate. Also, he said that human resource infrastructure in Laos need to harmonise its system with ASEAN. After joining ASEAN, he said, Laos experienced some changes in trade and investment and it was good for its economic development. As a land-locked country, he maintained that Laos is trying to enhance the pace of its development by attracting investment. He cited an example of a project on high-speed train connecting China. He said that China is 2nd largest trading partner for Laos, while Vietnam stands at third place; and India is 4th largest export market for Laos. He stressed that the economic relationship between Laos and India is good and improving.

Finally, Dr. Mahjabin Banu, President, SPRE, and Visiting Fellow with the Centre for Vietnam Studies in New Delhi, presented her perspective on Vietnam, ASEAN, and India-Vietnam relations. Starting her talk with history and culture of Vietnam, she emphasised that Vietnam carries a good reputation for successfully hosting global and regional dialogues. It has a shown long standing commitment for ASEAN integration. She said that in 1998, Vietnam hosted a ASEAN summit, and called for enhanced cooperation among the member countries.

Dr. Banu discussed about the Hanoi Plan of Action which called for macroeconomic and financial cooperation, harmonisation of customs procedures, and trade liberalisation. She mentioned that the Hanoi Plan of Action also called for enhancing efforts for the resolution of South China Sea dispute. Specifically, she stressed that if we are talking about the ASEAN region, we cannot escape Vietnam’s concerns about the South China Sea dispute. She said that in recent months, China has illegally entered into the exclusive economic zone of Vietnam several times. She called for quicker implementation of the code of conduct in the South China Sea.Dr. Banu also discussed about India-Vietnam bilateral cooperation in education sector as well as in defence and strategic issues.

After the technical session, the moderator Dr. Faisal Ahmed opened the video conference forum for Q&A session. It included active participation by delegates and speakers joining from India and abroad including those from Vietnam, Lao PDR, Thailand, Malaysia, Nepal, Jordan, Switzerland, South Korea, Ethiopia, and the United States.

Related

President Ho Chi Minh and his ideas about the world peace

The world would be celebrating the 130th birth Anniversary of President Ho Chi Minh on May 19th ,2020. He was named as Nguyen Sinh Cung after his birth inHoang Tru in Central Vietnam but adopted Ho Chi Minh (“Ho the Enlightened One”) as his name in early 1940s. He aspired for collective consciousness and loyalty to the nation. He proposed independence within society rather than independence of each individual.

President Ho Chi Minh was one of the strong supporters of Asian unity, and in one of the messages send to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru during the Asian relations conference he said that this solidarity would make the Asian countries the mightiest defenders for the world speech and democracy. Alluding to the fact that Asian family is critical for unification and independence, he said that the brotherly countries in Asia would support Vietnam so that the objective of unifying North and South Vietnam could be realized.

President Ho Chi Minh was equally concerned with regard to peace in Asia and the world and during one of the welcome party speeches given in the honour of Prime Minister Nehru in Hanoi in 1954, he said that in order to maintain understand and peace, the people and the government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam are determined to execute correctly the ceasefire agreement signed in Geneva. He thanked the International Control Commission managed by Indian, Polish and Canadian delegates for having toiled hard and worked closely with the general headquarters of the Vietnam people’s army and gained sound results.

In most of his correspondence related to the ceasefire agreement between France and Vietnam, he was apprehensive that the imperialist powers should show some resolve to maintain peace. In one of the interviews given to the Indian news agency in 1954 on the question of the ending of the war with French, he said his purpose was to ‘…. promote peace, foster unity, independence and democracy across the country’. In performing these duties, he reiterated, “we are willing to sincerely cooperate with Vietnamese individuals or groups who supports such policies, regardless of their political and religious beliefs’’.

During the June 1954 Prime ministers of China, India, and Myanmar signed a joint declaration which stressed of the five guiding principles(Panchsheela) which included the respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity; do not violate each other; do not interfere into internal affairs of each other; treat each other equally on the basis of mutual benefits and live peacefully together. President Ho Chi Minh completely endorsed these five principles of peaceful coexistence.

In his separate meetings with the three leaders of China (Zhou Enlai), India(Nehru) and Myanmar (U Nu), he buttressed the need for Asian peace and understanding. In one of the interviews given to the Indian New Age weekly on the question of building of military alliances and bases, he said that these military blocs and bases are threat to peace in Asia and the entire world. He also indicated very often to the growing coalition movement of Asian and African peoples. He always aspired for peaceful unification of North and South Vietnam and holding of elections under democratic process as further enunciated by the Geneva accords.

President Ho said in one of his speeches given on February 7th 1958, ‘at the present time, peaceful forces have been developing, more and more people have been raising their voices for disarmament, stopping nuclear testing and hydrogen bomb, protesting NATO, Baghdad and South East Asia bloc, requesting the world leaders to organize conferences for minimizing the tensions across the world.’

In the joint statement given during his visit to India in 1958, the two leaders (Ho Chi Minh and Nehru) specifically indicated that ‘the developments in the areas of aeronautics, atomic and hydrogen warfare has put the need for peace more than ever’. The two sides agreed that it was imperative to organize a high level conference to find solutions so that the atomic and hydrogen weapons test can be stopped. There was a need for gradual disarmament and easing of the world situation, and expressed the hope that the conference will soon be convened addressing the subject. The two sides stressed that the military blocs have made the international situation precarious and determined that there is need for ideological adversaries to maintain the world peace as well as develop understanding among nations.

In his congratulatory message given on the occasion of India’s Afro Asian solidarity conference 1955, he said, ‘…the conference would be contributing to the cause of fight for the end of colonialism, disarmament and the end of the Cold War to protect freedom, independence and bring peace’.

President Ho Chi Minh was also very influenced by the Buddhist ideals of peace, forgiveness, spirituality, minimalism, and non-ego as the critical elements of human survival and global peace.Ho Chi Minh idea was to develop human affection, sacrifice world pleasures for the people; self-improvement, regular quality exercises, developing human ethics, forge close bonding with people and creating a mass grassroots movement for people’s solidarity. He also looked into the Buddhism ideals which included philosophy, developing a peaceful outlook towards the world, sincerity, goodness, beauty, mercy, impermanence and protecting oneself from misfortune, and the problems germinating because of more pompous live than usual. He even during the visits to different nations and official letters alluded to the spiritual integration, mercy, altruism, ethics, human quality and empathy with fellow human beings.

In fact, one of the ideas that President Ho Chi Minh derived from Buddhism was related to peaceful humanity of Buddhism and Buddhist consciousness in every activity.

If one analyses the resonance in President Ho Chi Minh ideas, it was primarily aimed at bringing about global peace through anti-colonialism and reducing the influence of imperialist powers so that development and growth can be ushered among the newly independent nations. In his letters, he has reposed faith with regard to Geneva accord and time and again in his personal correspondence stressed on democratic principles and respecting will of the people. However, he was conscious of the fact that imperialist powers will not give away easy freedom to the colonies that they possess. In order to pressurize the imperialist powers, he had urged the newly independent countries to avoid power bloc politics and strive for the betterment of the people. His commitment towards his people and unification of Vietnam through peaceful means has been largely unreported but looking into the letters that he had sent to various leaders one thing crops up in each of the letters that he had always striven for global peace and development. It was the last line in most of his letters.

During his visit to India, he had visited Punjab to look into the construction of the Bhakra Nangal dam and was astonished to see that how a single dam could resolve the problems related to power generation and dedication in that particular region. Also during his leadership, he was very of the fact that prolonged wars are not good for the society and the general people. His stress on disarmament, and against Cold War highlights this fact that he was foreseeing the tension which might get intensified because of Cold war. He had full faith in the UN as an institution and was categorical that the global body must undertake initiatives to protect the rights of the people and the suffering of the people in the dependencies should be reduced.